NAME
libblkid - block device identification library
SYNOPSIS
#include <blkid/blkid.h>
cc file.c -lblkid
DESCRIPTION
The libblkid library is used to identify block devices (disks) as to
their content (e.g. filesystem type) as well as extracting additional
information such as filesystem labels/volume names, unique
identifiers/serial numbers, etc. A common use is to allow use of
LABEL= and UUID= tags instead of hard-coding specific block device
names into configuration files.
Block device information is normally kept in a cache file
/etc/blkid.tab and is verified to still be valid before being returned
to the user (if the user has read permission on the raw block device,
otherwise not). The cache file also allows unprivileged users
(normally anyone other than root, or those not in the "disk" group) to
locate devices by label/id. The standard location of the cache file
can be overridden by the environment variable BLKID_FILE.
In situations where one is getting information about a single known
device, it does not impact performance whether the cache is used or not
(unless you are not able to read the block device directly). If you
are dealing with multiple devices, use of the cache is highly
recommended (even if empty) as devices will be scanned at most one time
and the on-disk cache will be updated if possible. There is rarely a
reason not to use the cache.
In some cases (modular kernels), block devices are not even visible
until after they are accessed the first time, so it is critical that
there is some way to locate these devices without enumerating only
visible devices, so the use of the cache file is required in this
situation.
CONFIGURATION FILE
The standard location of the /etc/blkid.conf config file can be
overridden by the environment variable BLKID_CONF. The following
options control the libblkid library:
SEND_UEVENT=<yes|not>
Sends uevent when /dev/disk/by-{label,uuid}/ symlink does not
match with LABEL or UUID on the device. Default is "yes".
CACHE_FILE=<path>
Overrides the standard location of the cache file. This setting
can be overridden by the environment variable BLKID_FILE.
Default is /etc/blkid.tab.
EVALUATE=<methods>
Defines LABEL and UUID evaluation method(s). Currently, the
libblkid library supports "udev" and "scan" methods. More than
one methods may be specified in a comma separated list. Default
is "udev,scan". The "udev" method uses udev /dev/disk/by-*
symlinks and the "scan" method scans all block devices from the
/proc/partitions file.
AUTHOR
libblkid was written by Andreas Dilger for the ext2 filesystem
utilties, with input from Ted Ts’o. The library was subsequently
heavily modified by Ted Ts’o.
The low-level probing code was rewritten by Karel Zak.
FILES
/etc/blkid.tab caches data extracted from each recognized block
device
/etc/blkid.conf configuration file
AVAILABILITY
libblkid is part of the util-linux-ng package since version 2.15 and is
available from ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux-ng/.
COPYING
libblkid is available under the terms of the GNU Library General Public
License (LGPL), version 2 (or at your discretion any later version). A
copy of the LGPL should be included with this library in the file
COPYING. If not, write to
Free Software Foundation, Inc.
51 Franklin St
Fifth Floor
Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA
or visit http://www.gnu.org/licenses/licenses.html#LGPL
SEE ALSO
blkid(8) findfs(8)